


I like where you sleep (when you sleep next to me)

by coincidental



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: M/M, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-22
Updated: 2019-01-22
Packaged: 2019-10-14 06:10:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17503124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coincidental/pseuds/coincidental
Summary: Caleb's struggling to sleep aboard the ship and the captain's cabin has a bigger bed than Fjord needs. Sometimes a little kindness and comfort goes a long way.





	I like where you sleep (when you sleep next to me)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Purplehuntress3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Purplehuntress3/gifts).



> Little something for Holly due to my endless insistence about telling her my most angsty ideas.  
> Yes the title is a hellogoodbye song. Fight me. 
> 
> xoxo

The ocean is almost glassy, no breezes stirring the dark water and their ship bobs like a cork, no wind in its sails and nobody minding a moment to rest. The deck is largely quiet, two of their crew sat playing cards almost silently by lamp light, keeping an absent minded vigil, but nobody truly expects trouble. 

Caleb can’t sleep, tired though he is, cannot switch off the restless pace of his thoughts that he echoes with the restless pacing of his feet. He braces his elbows on the wooden rail at the stern, letting his head hang forward and his eyes close. 

Below decks, in the cabins, everything is too loud, too abrasively abuzz with either quiet merriment. Even in the dark cabins where people sleep, the creak of the hammocks sets his teeth on edge and the the slow swing of his own makes him a little nauseous. He exhales heavily where he stands, a long slow breath, steadying himself. 

The longer he stands, the more his belly settles its sick churn but he has no desire to return to his hammock and try again. 

From behind him, he hears the heavy tread of someone making their way onto the deck from below and a low easy, “Evenin’.” The voice is familiar, Fjord’s drawl. Caleb doesn’t turn, doesn’t know that he wants the company, though he’s got no intention of turning Fjord away either. His and Fjord’s uneasy truce has settled into something comfortingly straightforward, familiar. Caleb is ever reluctant to call his burgeoning relationships with the Nein’s members ‘friendship’, but he supposes that’s what their relationship is now. A friendship, if a sometimes hesitant one. 

Lost in his thoughts, Fjord’s tread on the deck is abruptly far closer than Caleb had previously processed. 

“Y’alright there Caleb?” There’s a brief touch of a broad, warm, spread hand on his spine, stroking from shoulder blades to mid back, then drawing away - a casual, easy thing. Fjord leans upon the rail beside him. “Not feelin’ the uh, relaxation goin on below?”  
“Ah, nein, no. I am tired, but I find I cannot sleep, so I thought I would get some air.” Fjord’s response is a thoughtful little hum of sound. From the corner of his eye, Caleb can see the half orc’s stare is miles out, unfocused, a lock of dark hair falling down onto his forehead.    
“I mean, it’s quieter up here. If you’d like you’d be welcome to sleep in the captain’s cabin. Real bed in there and all.” 

Caleb’s instinctive response is to brush off the kindness, but the grounding thought of a real bed makes him hesitate. “It’s really no trouble,” Fjord continues, nudging his shoulder lightly against Caleb’s and turning to catch his eye. Caleb lifts his head reluctantly and feels as though it’s filled with sand, heavy and cumbersome on his neck.    
“You do not mind? I do not want to exile you from your room,” he ventures, his eyes flitting from a laser focus on Fjord’s earnest face down to his feet and back again, pale blue peeking through the fan of his lashes. Fjord shrugs and lifts a hand to rub at the back of his neck. The movement makes a work of art of the lean strong lines of his arm, muscles shifting beneath his skin, displaying the more verdant green of the underside. Caleb struggles to look anywhere else.  
“Well, it’s a mighty large bed and those hammocks are real awkward - I don’t know how Yasha stands it…” Fjord’s words peter out into empty night air and the implication of it hangs between them. Caleb finds himself taken aback at the suggestion, at the intimacy of sharing a bed, as though they haven’t slept at closer quarters before. He feels foolish.   
“That would be okay by me,” he concedes, “if you are quite sure you will have me.” Fjord’s answering smile is a little crooked.    
“Wouldn’t have offered if I weren’t, would I?” 

Fjord pushes himself up off the rail and begins to walk away, heading down the short flight of steps to the main deck. He pauses, mid flight, twisting his upper torso in his effort to look back at Caleb.    
“You comin’ Widogast?” Caleb blinks, slowly, prompted to action as the words register.    
“Ja, I am coming, sorry.” His steps are a brisk in an effort to not leave Fjord waiting and they traverse the last few steps together, Caleb on Fjord’s heels as he heads for the main cabin door. 

Caleb’s expression must still be as far off as his thoughts, because as Fjord makes his way into the dim room, closing the door behind them, he murmurs;  
“Copper for your thoughts?” Caleb finds himself making a vague gesture as he watches Fjord light a lamp on what was once Avantika’s dresser.    
“It has simply been a busy few days, you know, there is a lot to think about.” Caleb rubs the pink line on his palm from the mostly cured wound that had been. He watches Fjord do the same, unconscious of the tic and unknowing of Caleb’s own behaviour, and it sparks a strange feeling in his chest. The half orc makes a low sound of agreement in his throat, unbuckling his armour methodically and hanging it on some convenient hooks on the wall.    
“Ain’t that the truth.”

Something about watching Fjord divest himself of armour - battle scarred, toughened leather giving way to worn fabric crusted with salt and and peeks of skin normally hidden - has Caleb transfixed. The process feels achingly intimate and private at once, to so casually remove all that protects him thoughtlessly in front of Caleb. As Fjord toes off his heavy boots, he glances at Caleb.    
“You plannin’ on sleepin’ in that coat of yours?” he asks with a raised brow and a touch of amusement colouring his tone. Caleb feels the tips of his ears flush hotly in embarrassment and he shakes his head, busying himself with carefully unwinding the wraps from his arms. 

Stripping the layers of his own clothing is slow and a little clumsy, Caleb’s tired hands no match for the apparent complexities that unwinding his scarf and the buckle on his book harness present. He drapes his belongings on to the back of a chair, glancing across the room to see Fjord fetching pillows from a pile of excess bedclothes in a corner, the scarred expanse of his back bare. When he turns around, Caleb’s eyes are met too with the broad shape of his chest and the dip of his trim waist, a slightly soft belly belying the presence of a solid core of muscle. Caleb has seen Fjord unclothed before, but something about the situation startles him. 

Fjord takes in Caleb’s stare and falters, pillows in his arms, glancing down at his bare skin and back up.   
“Is this gonna be a problem? I just get real warm so I don’t usually wear my shirt. I can put it back on if you prefer.” Caleb swallows with an audible click, feeling tired and foolish. When Fjord has offered the kindness of sharing the bed, he should not be picking at pointless trivialities in the half-orc’s manner of sleep attire.  
“No, of course not, it’s no matter.” Caleb touches at his own shirt self consciously, aware of the anaemic pale canvas of his skin, the uneven show of his ribs. “I will not remove mine.” The statement sounds ridiculous as soon as it leaves his mouth. Why would Fjord care? Why does Caleb even need to share that information? His gaze finds his feet and the exhaustion makes his head spin. He’s too tired to fret over this absurd situation.   
“Whatever you want, doesn’t bother me either way.”

Pillows hit the bed with a soft whump of shifting air and soft fabric. Caleb ventures his gaze upwards again and sees Fjord climbing into the bed, a surprisingly large thing with an ornately carved headboard and raised edges that cradle the mattress and presumably prevent one from tumbling to the floor if the ship rocks heavily. 

Fjord nods to the lamp. “Bring that over or put it out?” Caleb reaches out and extinguishes the lamp without hesitation. In the dark, it’s easier to pad across the short distance separating himself and Fjord, fumble blind hands for the edge of the bed, feeling for the cool sheets as he too climbs in. 

Whilst the bed looked large at a glance, lying on his back beside Fjord, the space feels infinitesimally small. Heat radiates from Fjord and Caleb feels the closeness of it along his arm, knows that if he shifted his hand a scant few centimetres it would be touching the half orc, likely brushing Fjord’s bare skin - Caleb cannot imagine how warm that must be. 

In the limbo space of the dark cabin, time passes strangely, at once an age and only a moment. Caleb cannot stay still, shifting and re-adjusting constantly, trying to lie on his side facing away from Fjord, like it would negate the other’s presence in the bed. 

“You gonna stay still for even one minute?” Fjord asks, his low drawl jarringly loud in the dark room. Caleb stills, freezing up, self-conscious guilt flooding him with a sense of shame that lights up his cheeks and the back of his neck with a hot flush.    
“I ah- I can leave you alone and head back downstairs, if you want, I am- Scheiße, I am sorry.” He cannot help curling in on himself a little, turning his face to hide it against the pillow.

The touch of a steady, warm hand tentatively touching his hip feels like a bolt of lightning. It burns where Fjord’s pinky finger brushes the slip of bare skin between his trousers and his loosely untucked shirt.  
“Cay- Caleb. I wasn’t tellin’ ya to leave.” The shudder that runs through Caleb is hard to control.   
Fjord must have felt it. He’s not cold, cool perhaps, but it’s a plausible enough excuse that it’s worth the trying.  
“I just can’t settle, I do not mean to trouble you, I- I am simply- my head is so. Ich denke zu viel. And it is cold, I am cold.”    
“I can’t be sayin’ I know what that last bit meant, but as for the cold, why don’t I just-” Fjord huffs and shifts behind Caleb.

There’s a pause, a beat, a waiting moment in which Caleb can almost hear Fjord overthinking. He himself feels as though his thoughts are suspended. Then Fjord’s hand squeezes his hip gently and the warm line of him presses up close, all the way along Caleb’s back in a solid line of radiating heat. It’s so shocking it takes his breath away, makes him inhale sharply, eyes flying open. He stutters, no words making it from his lips.    
“I run pretty warm, I can help ya with that part. This okay? Only seems logical. I can move once you’ve warmed through some.”

Caleb shifts a little and closes his eyes. The heat from Fjord sinks into him like lying fireside and he feels utterly unable to help himself, melting into the mattress like a man made of wax. He makes a sound somewhere between a sigh and a groan. Fjord’s chuckle, when it comes, is not cruel or mocking, just laced with an affection Caleb cannot quite place.  
“See? You’ll warm up real quick.” Fjord’s hand on his waist shifts and rubs up and down his side briskly, imbuing Caleb with a growing heat both in his torso and on his cheeks. The touch is matter of fact, friendly, well intentioned, and all Caleb can think of is the strength of it and Fjord’s calloused palms.  
“I- I am already warmer. Danke schön. You must not- “  
“I don’t mind a bit,” Fjord assures him, “just relax. Don’t mean nothin’, sharing some body heat. Done it a whole bunch of times with friends.” 

At that assurance, Caleb allows himself to let go of the tension in his shoulders, allows himself to bask in the warmth Fjord offers and the safety the bracket of his body represents. It’s comforting in all the ways Caleb craves. 

They’re both quiet a long while and Caleb must doze off, because he wakes to Fjord’s gentle hand on his hip and he heat slowly shifting away from his back. He makes a sound of protest, reaching thoughtlessly for Fjord’s wrist to stop him removing that delicious line of heat from Caleb’s back. The movement wakes Caleb the last bit and his actions register in a stuttering mental halt leaving him frozen in place.  
“Y’seemed warm,” Fjord ventures after a beat, “so I was gonna leave ya to sleep.” Caleb wets his lips and clears his throat, deciding for once in his life to be brave.  
“You do not have to move away,” he suggests quietly, voice roughened with sleep. “I would not mind. You are ah- you are very warm. It was comfortable.” 

Behind Caleb the solid warmth of Fjord’s body presses up close again, his belly to Caleb’s lower back, knees tucked into the backs of knees. It fits so easily.  
“Y’don’t mind huh?” Fjord’s voice is right by Caleb’s ear, low and intimately close, that soft slurred edge of someone who is halfway to sleep blunting the edges of it.  
“It is good. I like… this.” Caleb’s own voice is small and tired. Fjord only hums thoughtfully in response.

Caleb has just closed his eyes again, lashes dipping down to brush the tops of his cheeks, when he feels the decided shift of Fjord’s arm and the hand on his hip shifts to settle flat on his stomach. He exhales a shuddering breath he had no idea he was holding.    
“Okay?” Fjord asks, quiet.    
“Ja,” Caleb murmurs, realising, that: yes he is alright and yes, this is warm, steady and good. 

The ship rocks just a little on the the quiet ocean, small barely noticeable shifts. It is quiet in the cabin, dark and safe. Sleep comes towards Caleb inexorably, albeit slowly, sweeping him up in easy layers of drowsiness.    
“Guten Nacht, Fjord.” He’s not sure if the half orc hears, so long is the quiet. Then a low rumble;   
“G’night Caleb, sweet dreams.” Caleb doesn’t know if he imagines it, maybe so, in that warm close space he might, but he feels the softest brush of lips to the back of his neck in a silent kiss. 

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a little kudos or a kind word if you liked this, it's always much appreciated <3


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